If you learn nothing else from the documentary "To Be Takei," it's that the last name of actor George Takei is pronounced "Ta-KAY," not "Ta-KIGH."

There's plenty more to learn from Jennifer M. Kroot' admiring portrait of the man best known for playing Lieutenant Hikaru Sulu on "Star Trek." The movie hopscotches through Takei's various pre- and post-"Trek" identities to create a mosaic testimony to the power of reinvention.

When he was a young child, Takei's family was shipped off to Japanese-American internment camps, a formative event. Several scenes in "To Be Takei" chronicle the attempts to stage a musical called "Allegiance" based on the experience.

As a teenager, Takei realized he was gay, but remained closeted while pursuing an acting career and gaining fame as the helmsman of the U.S.S. Enterprise (disproving, as Takei notes, the stereotype of the Asian driver). Only in recent years did Takei come out as a forceful advocate for civil rights and gay marriage, though he had been involved peripherally in politics for years.

Takei's longtime significant other and manager, Brad Altman, steals plenty of scenes as the detail-oriented partner with a healthy sense of humor. (One section provides a good look at the behind-the-curtain experience of celebrity guests at Seattle's Emerald City Comic-Con.) Their relationship seems to be exactly the sort that makes the best argument against opponents of gay marriage: loving, respectful and eternal.

Kroot scored interviews with a wide range of figures, from Asian-American politicians Daniel Inouye and Norman Mineta, to gay rights advocate Dan Savage, to the current Sulu, John Cho. The film also includes interviews with Takei's surviving crewmates from "Star Trek," who are pleased and supportive of his late-in-life success — with one notable exception. William Shatner, it must be said, comes off as an insufferable, pompous jerk.

Maybe he's jealous. After all, at age 75, Takei is an openly gay Asian American with an overwhelming social media fan base, making him the one who has really gone where no man has gone before.

The lowdown: The life of George Takei, best-known for playing Sulu on "Star Trek," turns out to span World War II Japanese-American internment camps and the present-day fight for the legalization of gay marriage. An affectionate, entertaining tribute to a vivacious, optimistic and enduring star.